Free Isle of Dogs by Patricia Cornwell Page A

and it seemed that when his father would get annoyed with his wife, he would make snide asides to little Bedford about never allowing a woman to run and ruin his life.
    “They’re full of mendacity, women are,” Bedford’s father would say when the two of them were carrying in logs for the wood-burning stove or shoveling snow off the brick sidewalk in front of their imposing brick house that rose before a backdrop of mountains. “They’ll sweet-talk you, son, and make you think they’re right desperate to have sex with you, then when they’ve got you wrapped around their fingers and saddled down with kids, guess what?”
    “What?” Bedford had begun giving voice to what would become his most frequently asked question.
    “What?” echoed his father. “I’ll tell you what! They’ll suddenly announce that the ceiling needs to be replastered or the molding is crumbling or there are cobwebs hanging from the chandelier, right when you’re in the middle of . . .”
    “Oh,” Bedford replied as he dumped split logs into the bin by the stove.
    “Let’s just put it this way,” his father went on while his wife worked on a needlepoint in her parlor upstairs. “Half of you was scattered over the quilt, son. That’s probably why you’re a runt with bad eyesight.”
    “What exactly did Mummy say?” Bedford had to know the truth. “Was she asking about the ceiling or the cobwebs?”
    “Neither one. Not that night. She sat straight up in bed and said, ‘Why, I don’t believe I fed the cat.’ ”
    “Had she?” young Bedford inquired, and he would never forget his dismay at learning that he would forever be visually impaired, short, and homely—all because of a cat. “Why would Mummy suddenly think of the cat at that precise moment?”
    “That’s exactly what I mean about women, son. They think of all kinds of things at that precise moment because they want to create a diversion.” His father shoved a log into the wood stove and sparks flew up in protest. “Your mummy knew exactly what she was doing when she brought up the cat.”
    Since then, Bedford Crimm not only hated cats, but he also carried a pain in his heart and was deeply insecure because his mummy had committed interruptus during his conception, thus spilling much of his vitality on the quilt. She could not possibly have loved her quickening son much, Bedford mused unhappily as he picked at a poached egg he could scarcely see and groped for the pepper mill and continued to tune out his wife, who was having a stressful conversation with Pony about people who have been struck by lightning. Crimm believed he had put his unfair childhood behind him when he had become powerful in politics, and now Trooper Truth had brought it all back.
    A miasma of paranoia and anger leaked through Crimm like a noxious gas, and his submarine went into alert. Somehow Trooper Truth knew the truth about the mightygovernor’s shameful start in life and the last thing Crimm needed was for others to find out. Oh, of course Trooper Truth knew! He knew everything. Why else would he have mentioned mummies in his essay?
    “This is an outrage!” He slammed his fist down on the table and a silver candlestick toppled over into the butter dish.
    The breakfast room froze in silence.
    After a moment, a startled Maude Crimm said to him, “My goodness! It’s a good thing that candle wasn’t lit, dear, or the butter might have caught on fire. Real butter is animal fat and will burn just as easily as lighter fluid.”
    “Not quite as easy as that, ma’am,” Pony voiced his opinion. “But don’t want to take no chances.” He picked up the candlestick and wiped it off with the napkin draped over his arm. “Don’t want no fires in the mansion. This place would go up in flames quick as a dried-out broom, old as it is.”
    “Here we are talking about lightning and people’s homes and clothing burning up, and then a candlestick lands in the butter,” the First Lady said in